Kaitlin and Eric Baby Quilt

 

Baby Girl Windmills

 Commissioned by Patty. This candy picture, the idea of Spring Bunnies, and baby girl was my inspiration. 

So..... Here's what I came up with!

I decided to free motion this quilt on the JUKI, since the bobbin on my Baby Lock has been kicking my butt lately.

Based on a Missouri Star Quilts Company tutorial, made from strips cut from fat quarters and yardage. Each block was a 20x2.5 inch pair. 

https://youtu.be/eSzdUloKtpM

Baby Quilt Savor Party Scraps

 Patty fell in love with the Savor Party Silent Auction Quilt and asked for something similar for a new baby! 

Peru Souvenir

 I purchased a couple of pieces of woven wool on my trip to Peru with ideas about a hat band and some coasters for my travel companions. 

Patty's Nest 2024 Intention

 When Patty asked me what was my 2024 Intention... The word that was going to be my inspiration or challenge this year I confessed I had not even thought about it! 

She told me the word NEST was whispering to her... She thought it meant to focus on her home and family this year. 

This is a small quilt....maybe a table topper. It has a nest made from brown twigs and little green grasses. Inside the nest are three beautiful and unique blue eggs. 

Surrounding the nest are green leaves and glimpses of blue sky. 

The border are beautiful Japanese fabric flowers. 

It was densely quilted on the Juki, free motion easily due to the small size.

I then asked COPILOT, The Google AI, to compose a poem about a nest being a home. It rendered about 16 stanzas. I selected a few of the verses and tweaked them a bit and wrote them on the back. 

For within these walls made of leaf straw and feather,

Lies the heart of a family bound tightly together.

It holds a sweet promise of safety and rest,

A symbol profound. Home above the rest.

For home is not just where we lay down our head,

It's where we are loved, and our spirits are fed. 

Outer Space Baby Quilt

 Patty asked me to design a baby quilt for Sammy's childhood friend having her first child. The shower invite was the inspiration. 

So I looked at a favorite Ohio Star pattern I have made before in 6 inches. 

https://youtu.be/Dh6K4zUnfw8?si=niBkidwn0unUhKLD

Darling huh? 

The quilt features these 6" star blocks in golds, blues and silver. The border is a sweet sunshine and clouds in the sky. The back is tiny stars and planets on blue. 

I love to use any leftover blocks and scraps to widen the backing. 

I used more angular designs in the border versus curvy. Good old Clamshells quilting thru the body is a good solid choice. 

Nightfall in Blues

 First finish 2023, New Years Day. 

Inspired by a tutorial on Missouri Star Quilts, https://youtu.be/UhTooAVmjZE

I made this quilt from blues and contrasts purchased at JoAnn Fabrics from their own inexpensive line, Quilters Paradise. On sale for just $2.99 a yard, I bought around 24 quarter yards and added a few fabrics from stash. 

The block is a split HST; easy but busy, and I started with a 9.5 inch (v 10") to accommodate my quarters.  

Patty commented on this quilt that they were "her colors" and ahe told me she was inspired by my CONNECT quilt to set a 2023 intention. Her word would be CARE. So I added a bit to this quilt and gifted it to Patty. 

Snail Trail Green Orange Baby Quilt

 Made because I found the fabrics at Anaheim, and I wanted to.imptove on the Snails Trail QUILT Pattern I learned from Missouri Star Quilt's. 

Make a Snail Trail Quilt with Jenny!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgwMCzQHsZs

There are 4 main fabrics: 2 white backgrounds with critters and an orange and a green. The border has jungle animal names. 

Quilted free motion meander

A strip of fabric to widen the back. His scrap came from my nieces fabrics she used in photographing her first child every month of her first year. 

Patty lifted this quilt for her friend Karen's grandchild. 

Dog Quilt For A Fund Raiser

 My cousin Patty is making a basket to be raffled for a fundraiser at her church. She was telling me it's to be DogThemed. Treats, toys, all sorts of dog goodies. I offered to add a dog QUILT to the basket!

Jazzy models the new dog quilt. 

The fabrics have been collected over many years. Dogs, cats, alligators and a few birds. Favorite dog FOODS, like BBQ and burgers. Animal skins, paw prints, and even Snoopy's Joe Cool all turn up on this little quilt. 

The back is a soft flannel. It reads, My favorite people are dogs! 

I stitched it down 1\4 inch from the ditch. One of my favorite go to easy quilting techniques. Works nicely when the blocks are tumbler shaped. 

Southwestern Wedding Quilt for Kaity and Eric

 Made from a jellyroll of muted mottled dark colors, this delectable mountains quilt was finished before I realized it was perfect for my niece's wedding.  Postponed for a year due to the Pandemic, it was fast approaching. I had made a quilt in orange and green for them BUT when I saw this one completed, I KNEW this was the one for them! 

Bold and Beautiful Delectable Mountains

Las Vegas Quilt

My cousin Patti's husband LOVES Las Vegas. Always has, always will! So this year, when I learned he will he getting a knee replacement I started thinking about a healing quilt. I have made quilts for Patti, for their 3 daughters, but never one just for Alex! So..... Planning. 

A knee quilt? Couldn't picture it..... Legs? Nope, not coming up with any inspiration. Wait! For YEARS I bought and collected GAMBLING fabrics! Dice, cards, roulette, bingo, keno..... If they invented it, I bought a piece of it! 

I kept it simply designed so the fabric collection could do the talking. It's a large lap quilt to recuperate with and then nap under next winter. For Alex. 

 

Christmas Quilt for my Nieces

 I decided to make Christmas Quilts for each of my great nieces this year. 

They are for signing, as each niece is now an adult, starting their own families and traditions. 

Each lap quilt has plenty of white or blank space and very simple quilting in the ditch. The idea is the blank space is for annual greetings from whoever they spend Christmas with!  Their Mom, my cousin, helped me decide which quilt for which niece.  Good thing too, I had them totally wrong!  

My Cousin's Quilts

 My cousin Patti. We grew up apart, but have known each other since forever. When Patti was a young adult she moved to California and lived with my parents for a few years. Now we live around 60 miles apart, and are the closest relatives either of us has. Both retired now, with just a pandemic standing in our ways! 

My mother taught us both to sew as youngsters. For me it took off and has become a life long passion. Patty, on the other hand, took to it slowly. But she tried her hand at a quilt before becoming a mother and worked on one project. It was all hand cut and hand stitched.  She took a class at Parks and Rec. She labored over each sampler block, turning out some spectacular 12" blocks. Then they got stashed away, replaced by her first, then second, then third children. 

30 years later, that first child on the brink of marriage, Patti pulled out the blocks and fabrics and asked me if I would finish them for a wedding gift.  Since Pat confessed she wasn't likely to make more I asked her if I could turn them into 3 small quilts, so each daughter could have one. Yes!  She gave me creative license, a bag with many completed blocks, a couple cut but not completed blocks and fabrics from the original project. 

 

I completed the blocks, added 2 simple blocks of my own, sashed them with Pat's scraps and found 3 great fabrics from my stash for borders.  Machine quilted in a meandering pattern, then washed and fluffed.  Three magnificent quilts for three beloved daughters!  

They are done. They will be gifted to the three this spring.  What a great surprise! 

Alex photobombing.

Mother's Day 2021